


Melt Into the Wind

by calembours



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-27
Updated: 2011-12-27
Packaged: 2017-10-28 06:05:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/304557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calembours/pseuds/calembours
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A character exploration for Hikaru and the events that occurred on the Narada's mining platform.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Melt Into the Wind

_Fear cannot be banished, but it can be calm and without panic._  
\- Vannevar Bush

 _For what is it to die, but to stand in the sun and melt into the wind?_  
\- Kahlil Gibran

 

 

Pike asks for volunteers and Hikaru steps up, knowing if he didn't he'd feel sick the entire time the away team was gone, knowing he should've said 'me, I can do it sir'. With the Romulan's 'request' and the platform extending down to the planet, blocking their transporters and communications, Hikaru knows there are only two potential paths for him on this mission. Neither have very high hopes of ending well.

The path down to the shuttle bay is long and tense when Hikaru meets up with the other officers, having made a very quick stop to his quarters. He nods at Pike, and they continue through the decks, a short marching column of intention that causes other crew members to move out of the way for them. Hikaru suddenly finds himself a witness to promotions, and though he doesn't know how Kirk rates acting first officer, Hikaru's a little relieved that of the three of them, he's not the one being fast tracked up command. His stomach clenches at the thought of free falling through the atmosphere, something he has only done it twice in simulations, let alone being given abrupt potential command of the new Starfleet flagship. One day. Not yet.

Olsen is eager when they appear in the bay and he's armed to the teeth with explosives they'll need. With the engineer buzzing with so much energy, Hikaru feels his own nerves pale in comparison. It's a little easier to suit up, sliding into the yellow jumpsuit and pulling the cords and ties taut. Kirk and Olsen do the same, and for a moment Hikaru can almost pretend that it's just a simulation, that it's for marks, and experience. Pike moves past them to enter the shuttle, command gold bright at the edge of Hikaru's vision, instead of the impersonal blacks of Academy instructors. It pushes the illusion right out of Hikaru's mind, settles somewhere just beyond the reassuring extra weight of a weapon strapped to his suit.

Take off sequences beep and flicker across the shuttle screens, familiar like letters from home, and Hikaru eases into the rumbling motions of pre-flight. He wants to take the controls, ease his fingers across the screens and guide them out into space, but that's not why he's along on this mission.

"So, what kind of combat training do you have?"

Hikaru doesn't know Kirk, but can accurately assume what his reaction will be. "Fencing." The dawning horrified look he gives Hikaru makes a smile linger at the corner of the pilot's mouth. He feels satisfied somehow when he leans back and pulls up the gear's hood, helmet on at Pike's command.

The door to the cockpit snaps shut. Handles drop open from the ceiling, and the three of them step forward to hold them loosely. They let go after the gravity changes to press them flush against the shuttle roof.

Heart pounding, they breath in chorus as the suit's comm systems click on.

"Good luck."

Adrenaline and the initial push from the shuttle runs through Hikaru to wash away lingering anxiety. The planet is rust and white, jagged reaches of mountain and rock, a steadily growing shape below them. Arms to his sides, Hikaru stares into it, his body a needle cutting through the wind. It's quiet.

They follow the line of the mining extension, weightless, gathering speed as they're pulled in by the planet's gravity. Steady, breath in, breathe out. The pressure builds and they tear through the first layers of ozone, wisps of white atmosphere flickering past. Hikaru cringes at the squeeze, Olsen's voice one low grunt in his ear. Kirk is silent, breathe in, breathe out - practically text book.

Hikaru feels a little like he has weight again and the wind is rushing past them, tugging at his body while Kirk comms the Enterprise. The world focuses as they align for the landing. Figures and calculations on the screen of his helmet is suddenly noticed.

"Forty-five hundred metres to the platform," he hears himself say, quick, not quite a breath.

"Four thousand meters," Kirk says next, voice almost lazy.

"Three thousand meters," Hikaru's voice is almost over lapped by Olsen saying the same thing. Kirk confirms also and Hikaru makes the decision to pull parachute. His body flips one hundred eighty degrees, feet falling first as he slows dramatically. The burst of Kirk's blue chute appears below him, but Olsen remains a red blur, getting even smaller.

Pike told them to pull as late as possible, but Olsen's pushing it, two thousand, one thousand... Hikaru's sick feeling from earlier reappears, him and Kirk shouting-

Laughter, a blossom of red that lasts only two seconds before tumbling over the edge below the mining platform. They're left with a burst of static echoing through the helmet.

Hikaru watches the blue parachute make a similar path, drifting slower over the platform before dragging across. Kirk struggles; anchored but pulling against the wind the chute folds abruptly, leaving a dash of blue alive on the edge.

Four seconds, three seconds -

Suddenly there are holes blasted through his chute and Hikaru's trajectory is fucked, jerking into small drops as he makes his pass. He slides too far and has to circle quickly, swinging back the way he came. His chute snags on the platform, but the fire-glow of the mining rig looms in front of him, a steady pulse like a contained solar flare that he's going to embrace.

He swings up, parachute cords sending him higher, and Hikaru kicks out, heat kissing him without burning, and he swings out the opposite direction. A panicked slap to his chest prevents him from going back, and the winding gear of his chute pack pulls him over the platform edge, body bending along the path in protest. He can't even feel relieved because there's another sun-bright flare waiting for him, directly along the path of his chute lines.

 _So, what kind of combat training do you have?_

The blade of the sword retracts and Hikaru twists to swing an overhead slice at the cords grabbing him, cutting through them easily and leaving him sprawled on the platform. He's on his feet almost immediately, helmet off in a motion so familiar he might as well have been in a bout in some gymnasium somewhere. A cool readiness slides through him - he's landed on the platform, there are several Romulans to fight, and his sword is in his hand.

 _Fencing._

The Romulan facing him has an axe, is taller, broader, and has a racial strength advantage. Hikaru doesn't hesitate in his rush forward, flipping over the first strike and pivoting, coming around with a horizontal slice that is blocked and held. It tests his stance and Hikaru throws a punch. It connects and they disengage, but Hikaru's next strike is blocked again and he's pushed back with a short kick.

They test each other, parrying and keeping up the attack, but Hikaru lacks the brute strength he needs to take advantage. Each heavy drop of the axe pushes him back and eats at his stamina, the double bladed weapon slicing closer and closer with each pass. Two fierce strikes from above and Hikaru is sent sprawling, though to the Romulan's credit, he isn't struck immediately when he's down.

Hikaru sees the bright flare of the mining platform begin to arch again and he glances up at the Romulan coming in to cut him down. Snapping up Hikaru deflects the overhead cut wide and immediately reaches through the hole in the Romulan's guard to deliver a two sharp jabs to his enemy's throat. The Romulan chokes and Hikaru spins out with a back kick, forcing him over the metal grate barely an instant before the fire shoots up to engulf him.

Kirk is yelling and Hikaru pivots to help, stabbing the Romulan through with none of the gentlemanly honour Hikaru appreciates in sanctioned bouts. "Gimmie your hand!" He knows there's no honour here.

The few seconds to breathe is fantastic, but so is blowing the shit out of the platform. It's mindless and simple, and for a moment Hikaru can smile, despite Olsen, despite the hole in Vulcan. A spinning disc drops past them, sending a shockwave bursting along the desert floor.

They wait for transport, and for a moment Hikaru forgets that he's still standing on the Romulan's disabled, but retractable, mining platform. "Kirk!" He yells, as he drops back over the edge - he's not sure what he expects the other man to do, but he seems to have all the answers that day and it seems like a good idea at the time.

No helmet, no chute. Hikaru spreads himself out over the wind anyway, eyes closed against the rush of air and dizzying spiral of the approaching rocks. The Enterprise is the best ship with the best crew - even though Hikaru knows the kind of calculations needed to get a lock on him, and the fact that transporting moving targets wasn't standard procedure, he holds the thought that maybe-

"-ld on!"

Hikaru barely has enough time to glance before Kirk crashes into him, spinning them both through the sky. Kirk yells, his arms tight enough around Hikaru to make him not think twice about flattening his palm over Kirk's chute release. The blue material bursts out behind Kirk, like some modern unfurling of wings, and they at least jerk mostly vertical before the parachute rips free to flutter away from them.

He blanks out Kirk's voice then and tips his head on the buffeting back to watch the sky twirl above them. Kirk's yelling through the comm like it's going to get them to safety, grip like iron, pinning Hikaru to his chest. Hikaru's not sure what he should be thinking about, what he should be saying. He never thought he'd get _time_ to figure out last thoughts and last words-

Everything fades and Kirk's yelling is quieting as if Hikaru is slowly passing out, or passing on. He's surprised when there's a flicker of displacement and he crashes apart from Kirk on the glowing floor of a transporter room. There's a pleased exclamation in a language Hikaru doesn't know, and he forces out a thanks to whoever will take it, ducking his head from view.

He's _alive_.

The young ensign in the transporter's seat is the same helmsmen Hikaru vaguely recognizes from the bridge, though what he's doing in the transporter room is beyond Hikaru. The navigator tells them what has been happening to Vulcan in quick accented English while Spock is down on the planet. Barely minutes later, there's another beam up.

"I'm losing her, I'm losing her!"

Hikaru doesn't even know who she was, but his heart is pounding like he does. It could have been him, or Kirk, or any of the other vulcans on the transport pad, but it was _her_. Just like that.

Gone.

 

 _Destiny is something we've invented because we can't stand the fact that everything that happens is accidental._  
\- Unknown


End file.
